Hideki Okajima has been granted his release by the Softbank Hawks in Japan so that the 37-year-old reliever can pursue his plan of returning to MLB.

Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chroniclereported yesterday that the A’s are among the teams interested in Okajima, who played five seasons for the Red Sox before heading back to Japan last year.

Okajima fell out of favor in Boston, spending most of 2011 in the minors, but he posted a 3.11 ERA for the Red Sox overall and had a 0.94 ERA in Japan last season after a minor-league deal with the Yankees was canceled due to shoulder problems.